Responses
Wow your review is all I felt and wanted to say about this manhwa.
But at the end you mentioned that we didnt get to see the surprise for Sangwoo planned by Bum. But actually it was presented at the last chapter where Bum takes out a ring from his pocket and says how he wanted to put it on Sangwoo’s fingers. Bum probably planned to give it as an official gift to his husband, Sangwoo
Ohh! Ok, that completely slipped my mind. Thanks for pointing that out!
This series was so beautifully constructed and gripping all the way to the end, I couldn't look away like looking at a horrible car accident. I think the way it ended was probably the most fitting (I mean - ideally, everyone would get the therapy they needed, but since the author had no intentions of that, I am a little glad that Sangwoo died because I couldn't see any way for him otherwise to reconcile his trauma and live normally).
Since the intent of the author was to portray the cycle of progression for both Sangwoo and Bum, I will also take the ending of Bum's implied death as fitting too. This is because they, as characters, will never be able to break out of the themes in their life. Rather than character development, they were supposed to repeat their pasts and suffer until they crash and burn. As I was nearing the ending chapters, I thought to myself that the only way this could end is a couple suicide (which kinda/kinda didn't happen), granted the author did throw flags in there (i.e. the promise to kill himself (Bum) if Sangwoo dies).
Despite not really liking Sangwoo in the early chapters, or generally being ambivalent, I find that I can relate to him a little bit (as awful as that sounds haha), having come from a background of child abuse myself. The entire last portion of the series was Sangwoo revisiting his mommy issues; the author did a good job of cutting out a tragic figure of Sangwoo. Sangwoo's facial expressions during that scene where he revisits the last moments of his mother's life were so intense and visceral in communicating his mental state, it made me reflect a bit on my own traumas.
I find it interesting when he told the told the story of his birth, his father was a human "man", but his mother was a "devil". Trying to understand his relationship with his mother is so very complicated, there is attachment, along with hatred and disgust (and maybe an Oedipus complex? it's hard for me to conceive and digest his mother's sexual assault and the repercussions it had on Sangwoo so I can't say for sure). What is most interesting is how Bum overlays with Sangwoo's mother, I think Bum's unconditional affection for Sangwoo fulfilled something for Sangwoo, and perhaps reminded him of fonder aspects of his mother. At a certain point in the story, they were most definitely co-dependent on each other (I wouldn't go as far as call it "love", but there was definitely a sort of twisted attachment/affection), that was probably the closest they got to breaking out of their cycle of progression. And even if Bum started off as a parallel to his mother, I think he became an entity of his own to Sangwoo by the end - to a degree anyways. After all, Sangwoo called out Bum's name in the hospital, not for his mother. But the double edge of the sword was that Bum, the representation of the mother, was also a catalyst for Sangwoo to revisit the traumatizing aspects of his mother. His failure to completely disassociate Bum from the shadow of his mother became his undoing. What Sangwoo "wants" will always drive him to insanity in the end.
The mental unraveling of both Sangwoo and Bum were well portrayed, to the point where I couldn't fully trust what was shown through their perspectives anymore. Even that ending scene with Bum chasing after the image of Sangwoo, I thought he was already on the path to death and him navigating roads to get to Sangwoo was just a metaphorical representation of it.
The one character I didn't feel strongly about at all was, surprisingly the MC, Bum. Perhaps it's that mix of wishy-washiness, lack of self-confidence, and unconditional attachment despite abuse in the face of people that don't nearly care as much about you as you do to them, that remind me of the characteristics I hate most of myself....maybe. Like Sangwoo, he was a product of his abuse so rather than liking or disliking them, all I have is pity. And also anger at those that abused them.
One small loose end that still bothers me a little is we never found out about the surprise that Bum had planned for Sangwoo, cause he lost his shit in paranoia over the poison.